11- 



ceased singing since the young were hatched, and his state of alarm is 

 great if anyone passes near the nest. The eggs took exactly a fortnight 

 to hatch. 

 " Addenda. 



The brood of young Virginians mentioned above soon came to grief, 

 a bird or a beast of some kind, it is not known what, but jays were the 

 suspected culprits, made off with a couple, the two remaining birds I tried 

 to rear by hand, but they seemed unable to digest the food and to my 

 grief, died. The old couple at once began hunting for another nesting 

 place and fixed upon one quite close to the former site, but this time in a 

 low box bush, the nest was quickly finished and four eggi? deposited in it, 

 strict injunctions being given to the gardeners not to disturb it in any 

 way, and in order to try and guard against robbery from mice or squirrels, 

 I tarred the stem of the bush as far as I could and also placed some more 

 branches of box upon the thinner parts at the top, so as to hide the eggs 

 from prying eyes of unfriendly feathered fowl. But no ! after the hen 

 bird had sat out more than half her time, the eggs disappeared, and — 

 disappointment No. 2. 



" The Virginian Nightingales themselves seemed to lose less heart than 

 I did, for they actually commenced another nest the day after they had 

 lost their second hope of a brood, and, experientia docens, they built their 

 third nest in a holly tree of a somewhat weeping growth, placing it in the 

 under side of an overhanging branch about 9ft. from the ground. Four 

 eggs were again laid and hatched on the 5th of August of the same year 

 (1885) in which they had escaped : but when the young birds which 

 grew apace were about a week old, once more two disappeared, evidently 

 taken by a jay or a squirrel, for the nest was rather demohshed, so in 

 despair the other two were carried into the shelter of the house. One 

 was considerably larger than the other, and it was this one that succumbed 

 in a day or two, either to injuries or indigestion ; the other bird, an ugly 

 uncouth little creature was fed upon sopped bread and plenty of fruit — 

 strawberries, grapes, etc. : — 



" He throve, and he turned out luckily to be a male bird. I have him 



